That Stupid Tar Ball
by loveandallthat
Summary: Katara makes meat for the first time in a while, but Sokka is too busy looking for Toph. Where is she, and how will he get her out? another one for DireSphinx!


Yep

**Yep. I'm writing another story for DireSphinx. But DireSphinx liked my story so if somebody else would ask then you will probably like yours too! I really like writing specific stories for others, because then I have inspiration and a person to make the story work for. When I read the guidelines for this one I laughed, so I hope this story is as funny as the guidelines I based it off of. I don't own Avatar, and many ideas in here belong to DireSphinx, although I may have put my own spin on it…**

The air was full of the smell of meat. Katara had managed to get another pot to cook with and could now make a meat meal for most people and a veggie one for Aang. A hunting journey had immediately gone into action, and meat had been brought back to camp. Sokka's mouth watered. It smelled amazing, and he was in dire need of protein.

"What's THAT?" Aang asked. "Is that a giant ball of… tar? Where'd that come from? Well GO AWAY, tar ball!" Aang airbended (airbent?) the giant tar ball away from their area. He licked his lips in anticipation of the veggie stew that had been prepared. It looked delicious (to him, Zuko had said quietly that it looked like a pile of random colored clay, and The Duke had decided he felt too queasy to eat even the meat dish.)

Meanwhile, deep in the forest, Toph was practicing her earthbending. She was standing on two tall pillars like she had made Aang do. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a giant tar ball flew at Toph. Not that she noticed until it hit her.

She immediately headed for ground, but she couldn't bend as well in the air, and had trouble catching herself. Luckily, just as she was about to hit the ground, something caught her. She felt around. _Were those… vines? _She was stuck, dangling around three feet above the ground.

Sokka looked around. Where was Toph? Shouldn't she be here? But what about the meat? Sokka needed his meat. He hadn't had meat in weeks. He was absolutely crazily meat deprived, and it was tearing him up inside. Could he really abandon it just to go find Toph?

But then, many different horrible things that could happen crossed his mind, all of them involving a very injured Toph and a guilty feeling in his imaginary meat-filled stomach. "I'm going to go find Toph," he said to Aang, Katara, Zuko, and the rest of the people. He wondered aimlessly in the forest looking around.

"Toph?" he called out. He was walking and he tripped over a tree root. He kept walking, trying not to be really annoyed and making sure to keep an eye out for roots. Apparently, it would have been a better idea to look out for low branches, because that's what he hit his head on, which probably left a big bump. God, Toph was lucky Sokka liked her.

He heard a slight struggling sound.

"Toph?" Sokka asked, and followed the sound of the struggle. When he arrived, he found a distraught earthbender trapped in a tar ball and vines. He tried to stifle a laugh.

"Sokka?" Toph asked. Sokka burst out laughing, and Toph recognized his laugh. She blushed. She did not want anybody to see her like this, and it was twice as embarrassing for it to be Sokka.

"Toph, you're stuck in a TAR BALL!! It's hilarious. Oh, all the payback for your jokes I can get from this. You make fun of me, and get yourself caught in vines and tar. Oh, that's where that tar that Aang bended (bent?) away went! Oh, the irony. Wow, this is so great. I…" he trailed off when he saw the look that had frozen on Toph's face.

It was a cross between embarrassment, anger, and the simple need to get out of the stupid tar ball. There was a slight trace of something that took Sokka a while to decipher, but then he recognized it. It was helplessness. Sokka knew that feeling. He sighed.

"OK, I'll help you down from there." Sokka threw his boomerang and with impossibly good aim he hit every single vine, and the tar and Toph landed on the ground with a small thud. He tried to get away all the tar with his hands. They got stuck. He tried to use his feet to push away, and they got stuck. Soon he was as stuck as Toph, and also pretty close

"Uhh…" he said.

"Nice going meathead! Now we're both stuck!! Didn't you think that if I was stuck you would be too?" Toph yelled.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it was an accident! To think I gave up meat to come here to save you…"

"Wait… you gave up MEAT? For me? How stupid! Who gives up meat for a dumb little earthbender?" Toph said. She seemed to reconsider. "Thanks," she said with a small smile.

Sokka smiled too. "You aren't a dumb little earthbender. You're a smart little earthbender. I really like that about you."

He was telling the truth. Toph tried to hug him. It almost worked, and they half-hugged in the giant mess. They didn't really mind the fact that they were stuck in a giant tar ball, it was pretty nice to be here together. They didn't resist when Katara came by and used waterbending to get them out, though, they had been unable to move for long enough now.

From then on Toph mocked Sokka slightly less, and Sokka mocked Toph slightly more. But it was a nicer form of mocking, and they were happier, and as they grew up together and changed their relationship to become a couple, they realized that the stupid tar ball the had gotten stuck in was actually very beneficial.

The end!!

**I actually like how this turned out, I think my stories with plots from DireSphinx turn out really nicely, and I really love writing all the Tokka-ness. I have yet to write a kiss scene, or something that's actually serious, for that matter, but I really do have fun with innocence and random humor, that even when I try to write seriously I end up putting in (although this story was intended to be funny). I decided to make this over 1000 words, because I usually write short little oneshots. I only got to that many words cuz of these annoying author's notes though, sorry.**

**Thank you, DireSphinx, for giving me two great story ideas.**

**Reviews? Things you want me to write about?**


End file.
